Emerging Noble Metal Aerogels: State of the Art and a Look Forward

Abstract

Noble metal aerogels (NMAs), as the most important class of noble metal foams (NMFs), appear as emerging functional porous materials in the field of materials science. Combining the irreplaceable roles of noble metals in certain scenarios, as well as monolithic and porous features of aerogels, NMAs can potentially revolutionize diverse fields, such as catalysis, plasmonics, and biology. Despite profound progress, grand challenges remain in their fabrication process, including the efficient structure control, the comprehensive understanding of the formation mechanisms, and the generality of the fabrication strategies, thus inevitably retarding the material design and optimization. This Perspective focuses on the key progress, especially of the fabrication strategies for NMAs during the last two decades, while other NMFs are also succinctly introduced. Challenges and opportunities are summarized to highlight the unexploited space and future directions in expectation of stimulating the broad interest of interdisciplinary scientists.